


Things Like Us Are Ephemeral

by shinkonokokoro



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Porn, Gen, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-11
Updated: 2012-02-11
Packaged: 2017-10-30 22:50:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/337056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinkonokokoro/pseuds/shinkonokokoro
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's been an accident. And everything is not okay.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things Like Us Are Ephemeral

**Author's Note:**

> Pure self-indulgent angst. Blame [justaournalblog](http://justajournalblog.tumblr.com/). 
> 
> Also, I feel like I should put warnings on this, but for what, I am unsure...

 When John first got him home from the hospital and manhandled him up the stairs and to his bedroom (time number 5), he had high hopes that he guarded with the ferocity of a cornered lion.

Two months later, that hope turned sour and weak and old, something twisted and bitter because it can no longer reach the light. Too many times, he suspected of watching a formerly-brilliant man drool on himself or become confused at how to operate a microwave. Despite the fact that he'd taught him how that morning.

Sherlock was, to all those concerned, gone. The light switched off behind those pale eyes. The purpose gone from that mouth. The precision gone from limbs.

It was all he could do, some days, watching him flounder with kitchen supplies, trying to do something that John couldn't discern, forehead wrinkled with intent and focus that could only handle minutes at a time. John stood back and watched. He'd step in if or when anything dangerous came out.

Those _were_ the bad nights, after the accident.

Good nights were where Sherlock was interested in all the crap telly that John could stomach. But now, John wasn't interested because he found he only enjoyed it because of Sherlock's cutting commentary. 

Whatever John might have had of a social life before Sherlock's accident, it all ceased  _after_ because Sherlock needed, like a toddler, constant tending. He stayed on at the clinic until Mycroft pleaded (For him. The man said please 8 times. That counted as pleading) with John to just  _stay. Home_ . He would take care of all the finances.

Of course they were useless at crime scenes, so Lestrade never called. The man never visited either, because he could hardly look Sherlock in the face after the first time he'd come and the man leaned forward with a goofy smile and shook his hand a little too eagerly.

He'd never dare show his face at the Yard either. Sally can't look at Sherlock without flinching, her face screwing up into that awful expression half pity, half derision. And Sherlock. Sherlock tried ever so hard to be Anderson's friend the first time he'd seen him. Something about the shape of his face. The man was horrified and couldn't scramble out of the room fast enough.

Mycroft visited more frequently. He would even sit on the sofa and let Sherlock rest his head on his belly, humming. He was always so patient and kind that John wanted to be sick in a plant. But he made tea and filled Sherlock's special plastic cup, the tea mostly sugar and water, because Sherlock didn't like the bitterness.

And John would learn to deal with the small disasters, melt-downs, damage, fickleness, and general mood swings daily. Like the day he returned home from shopping to Sherlock's Tea Debacle. As near as he'd been able to understand amidst the blubbering was that Sherlock had decided to make tea. But he'd broken the mugs. John came home to the mess all over the floor, Sherlock wide-eyed with a tear-stained face in the corner of the kitchen. And of course he'd cut his hand; he'd tried to clean it up—hide the evidence. Like a child does when they break something for which they know they'll be punished.

But John won't punish Sherlock. Can't. He just settled a throw around his shoulders, cleaned off his cut, put a plaster on it, and made it all better with a kiss. Then he made the damn tea himself after cleaning up the mess and shards. Can't even be made because it was John's favourite mug too. Then he steered Sherlock back to the sofa and pet his hair until he fell asleep and drooled on John's trousers.

The worst days... The absolute worst were when Sherlock would come out of his bedroom, shirt buttoned up correctly, trousers on proper, and hair combed, and would say his name, sharp, authoritative, tell him he wanted tea, wander over to his computer, start it up, and then stare at the thing until John handed him his tea. Then Sherlock would startle, look up at John, eyes wide like he was lost, and slurp his tea while laughing at the way his toes wiggled. 

John waited, one day. He stood, tea in hand, and waited. Watching Sherlock, trousers done up proper, shirt neatly buttoned, hair combed, in front of his computer, fingers poised as if he'd paused in the middle of typing a thought. John waited for over two hours. Eventually the tea grew cold, and Sherlock whimpered, sagging out of his stiff posture, curling up beneath the desk. 

John threw his mug in the sink.

Or maybe the worst days were when Sherlock got...stuck. He wanted something and couldn't enunciate what it was, try to tell John who didn't understand and then explode into a full-on melt-down that usually ended with John somehow managing to pull Sherlock into his arms and squeeze him until his thrashing stopped. Even then he screamed until he was exhausted and finally sagged into John's restricting embrace. So much indignity for one who used to pride himself in it. 

John held him until he fell asleep, covered him with a throw, limped down to apologise to Mrs. Hudson who just smiled that same patient smile of knowing and waved him away. Then he went back up to their flat, quietly went up to his room, shut the door, and sobbed into his pillow for what he lost. Sobbed into his pillow for the man he lost. Sobbed into his pillow for the man who didn't know what he lost. 

 Those were the worst days. Because there was nothing he could do.


End file.
